Contents

Synopsis

On 24 July 799 UC(1 NIC / 490 IC / 3599 CE), the Wahlen Fleet arrives in the Sol Starzone. A Terraist within August Samuel Wahlen's flagship Salamander attacks Wahlen with a poisoned blade. Wahlen successfully fends off the would-be assassin, but his left arm has to be amputated and he goes into a coma. Meanwhile on Terra, Julian Mintz and Olivier Poplin realise the food being served to Terraists contain minute amounts of thyoxin, a mind control drug. Julian goes through withdrawal symptoms, and meets up with Poplin and Louis Machungo in the infirmary. On 27 July, Wahlen awakens from his coma and orders a ground assault and missile bombardments on the Terraist headquarters. When Julian and his friends realise that Terra has been invaded by the New Galactic Empire, they decide to help guide the Imperial forces (posing as infiltrators from Fezzan) so as to secure an opportunity to escape from the Terraist headquarters. As the Imperial forces engage the Terraists in extremely brutal close quarters combat, Julian and the others sneak into a Terraist data bank and swipe the data from the computers. Finally, the remaining Terraists self-destructs their headquarters as a last-ditch effort to deter the vastly superior Imperial forces; Julian's group narrowly escapes from being crushed by the collapsing headquarters.